Inspirational Living: Life Lessons for Success & Happiness

Listen to episode 531 of the Inspirational Living Podcast: Thoughtfulness & Living a Loving Life. Edited and adapted from Young People’s Problems by J.R. Miller.

Inspirational Podcast Excerpt: One of the finest things in a complete, well-rounded character is thoughtfulness. It gives a wondrous charm to your life. It makes you a benediction wherever you go. It tempers all your conduct, softening all natural harshness into gentleness, and giving to your every word and act, and to all your bearing, a spirit of kindliness.

A thoughtful person does not have to be asked to help others — they help, as it were, instinctively. They are ever ready to do the obliging thing, to say the encouraging word, to show an interest in the life of others, to perform those countless little kindnesses which so brighten the common pathway.

The thoughtful person does not make their life an offence or irritation to others. They never meddle with other people’s affairs, but respects the individuality and the rights of everyone. They curb their curiosity, and do not pry into matters of which they have no right to know.

Listen to episode 530 of the Inspirational Living Podcast: Values for Climbing the Hill of Life. Edited and adapted from Making the Grade by C.V. Mosby.

Motivational Podcast Excerpt: There is both a science and an art in the correct estimation of values. It takes training and mature judgment to pick the false from the true. And there is a fine art in the application of values to the things in life that are worthwhile. It is easy for us to fall into the error of thinking values are relative. Perspectives of value may indeed vary, but the inherent value remains. And the value of those things in life that assist in making the grade remain fixed and definite.

The value of patience, imagination, self-confidence, health, truth, and honesty of purpose remains the same, and will always be fixed and definite. It makes no difference what your estimation of them may be. A yardstick measures thirty-six inches. If one looks at a string that is thirty-six inches in length and says that it is only thirty-four, the thirty-six inches still remain; the value is not lost because some individual underestimated it.

A correct understanding of values that touch the great principles of life is an absolute necessity in making the grade. Your taste may differ from that of your neighbor; your likes and your dislikes may be entirely at variance; but all must agree on the worth of the cardinal factors that constitute a successful life.

Listen to episode 529 of the Inspirational Living Podcast: The Courage & Patience to Achieve Success. Edited and adapted from Making the Grade by C.V. Mosby.

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Inspirational Podcast Excerpt: Patience means more than being able to stick to a task until it is finished. It means having a philosophy that makes one understand that it is continuous, well-directed efforts that win. Furthermore, patience must have an imaginative eye that sees the completed task and pronounces it well done.

A mule can plod up and down the field. It makes no difference to the mule whether cotton or weeds are being plowed, but the farmer would have little patience if they did not feel that they would harvest more than a crop of weeds.

To be patient, to keep plugging along, to keep climbing the hill, you must be inspired by, and buoyed up with, the hope of reaching the top. It is not patience, but hopelessness that keeps one working at a task that holds out absolutely no promise of ultimate successful completion. The patience that helps carry one up the hill is the cheerful, hopeful kind. It is the kind that realizes the necessity of well-directed, intelligent, continuous effort.

Listen to episode 526 of the Inspirational Living Podcast: How to Make Your Life Marvelous | Motivation. Edited and adapted from Personal Power by Keith J. Thomas.

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Motivational Podcast Excerpt: Put the joy of creation into everything you do. Let it be worthy of your mind, and let it be done as perfectly as you can do it. If your employers cannot use you to better advantage, fit yourself for more congenial work elsewhere. It is your own fault if you complain: the remedy is always in your own hands. Complaints are signs of weakness, and if you are in a chronic state of dissatisfaction, words will avail nothing. Only by your own actions can you alter your own condition of life. If you are busy complaining when you ought to be busily acting, you are likely to complain until the end of the chapter.

How can you enjoy your leisure, if your mind is brooding over your grievances? Instead of railing against circumstances, you should take yourself to task because you allow your environment to worry you, and because you are not forming some plan which will eventually improve your state of mind, as well as your state of work.

Listen to episode 525 of the Inspirational Living Podcast: Answering the Riddle of Life. Edited and adapted from Personal Power by Keith J. Thomas.

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Inspirational Podcast Excerpt: Be sure that whatever troubles come to you, if you face them with courage, they will pass by as the idle wind, and leave behind the prosperity of which they are only the harbingers. Everyone who has faced sorrow and disaster, who has come through the fires of adversity, knows well from their own experience that for every trouble life can bring, there is some greater compensating advantage.

It is true that “All things work together for good.” The snows of winter serve to warm the earth and protect the seeds that bring forth the glorious blooms of summer. All through Nature and all through life we see that the things which are gloomy and unpleasant inevitably develop into brightness and happiness.

Listen to episode 524 of the Inspirational Living Podcast: The Heroism of Every Day Life. Edited and adapted from A Man’s Reach or Some Character Ideals by Charles Edward Locke.

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Inspirational Podcast Excerpt: In every age, we hear much talk of heroes. We are fascinated by stories and tales that spur the imagination to the loftiest heroism. But I would call your attention to the greatest of all heroism: that heroism which does not receive the plaudits of the crowd, nor attract the eyes of the multitude. It is not richly rewarded with treasure, and does not have medals struck for its accomplishments.

I am thinking of the rescues and battles, the sacrifices and generosities, and the invincible courage which are unheralded, unrecorded, and unrewarded, but upon which the security and prosperity of our times depend.

Many a person in a moment of emergency would rush at the risk of their life to the rescue of an imperiled friend; but that same person may not possess the stalwart heroism necessary to withstand certain temptations which are ruining their life and bringing agony to those who love them.

Listen to episode 523 of the Inspirational Living Podcast: Overcoming Hurry, Worry, and Irritability. Edited and adapted from The Freedom of Life by Annie Payson Call.

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Inspirational Podcast Excerpt: Remember that worrying is resistance, and resistance is unwillingness. Unwillingness interferes with whatever we may want to accomplish. To be willing that this, that, or the other thing should happen seems quite difficult, when to our minds, this, that, or the other thing may bring disaster. And yet if we can once see clearly that worrying resistance tends toward disaster rather than away from it, or, at the very least, takes away our strength and endurance, it is only a matter of time before we become able to drop our resistance altogether.

However, it IS a matter of time, and not instantaneous. So, once we are faced toward freedom from worry, we must be patient and steady, and not expect to gain very rapidly. We must be persistent, and resist the temptation to do nothing to overcome our worries.

I remember a woman who once said to me, "Now I have got something to worry about for the rest of my life.” Her face was set toward worrying. Nothing but her own will could have turned it the other way, and yet she deliberately chose not to use it, and so she was fixed and settled in her self-made prison for the rest of her life.

Listen to episode 522 of the Inspirational Living podcast: Inspiring Thoughts on Self-Development & Self-Growth. Edited and adapted from The Call of Life by William L. White.

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Inspirational Podcast Excerpt: The ushering in of a New Year brings with it to so many people New Year’s Resolutions. This is a splendid practice and I would not discount New Year Resolutions one iota, but instead give unto them strength. Indeed, I wish to encourage not only resolutions for the New Year, but to urge everyone to be on the alert, taking stock, visualizing, and planning to better not only ourselves, but our neighbors and that sphere of the world which we touch. And whenever a new thought for a better practice in the upbuilding of our lives crosses our minds, do not wait for the New Year to roll around to record it and start practicing it, but begin at once.

If the word resolution sounds "too tame," the words maxim or motto may be used. When carried to the final analysis it is “habit” that we are seeking, because after all, life consists of a bunch of habits. If everybody, especially young people, during the formative period of their lives, would give ten minutes to serious thought and write down on paper at least one resolution, maxim, or motto every week, which you intend to practice and actually incorporate into your life, we would see an astounding change for the better in the individual, which means, also, a rising generation.

Listen to episode 521 of the Inspirational Living podcast: Becoming Rich in Knowledge & Wisdom | Education. Edited and adapted from Right Living by Susan H. Wixon.

Inspirational Podcast Excerpt: That which we know is all our own. The more we know (the more we absorb of useful knowledge) the richer we become. Science which can be shown, demonstrated, and realized, is the desirable thing. Think about it. Does not actual knowledge put to flight all extremes of error and misunderstanding? Take a fact in Nature. Prove it, and it becomes yours. And not all the hyenas and bloodhounds of ignorance can take it from you.

As someone has said before, "There are two valuable possessions which no search warrant can get at, and which no reverse of fortune can destroy: they are what a person puts into their head (i.e. knowledge), and what they put into their hands (i.e. skill)."

Is there any limit to the acquisition of knowledge? No. Nobody has gained the whole of knowledge, and no one knows so much that they may not acquire still more. Sir Isaac Newton said at the close of his illustrious life, that the great facts he had found by study and search, were but pebbles on the seashore, compared to the vast ocean of knowledge still untouched.

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Listen to episode 520 of the Inspirational Living podcast: The Grand Secrets of Success | Self-Reliance. Edited and adapted from The Grand Secrets of Success, compiled by The Toronto News Company.

Inspirational Podcast Excerpt: There are different ways of getting on in the world. It does not always mean making money, or being a great individual for people to look up to. Leaving off a bad habit for a good one is getting on in the world; to be clean and tidy instead of dirty and disorderly is getting on; to be careful and saving instead of thoughtless and wasteful is getting on; to be active and industrious, instead of idle and lazy is getting on; to be kind and forbearing, instead of ill-natured and quarrelsome, is getting on; to work as diligently in the boss's absence as in their presence is getting on.

In short, when we see anyone properly attentive to their duties, persevering through difficulties, to gain such knowledge as shall be of use to themselves and others, offering a good example to their acquaintances, we may be sure that they are getting on in the world.

Those who wish to get on in the world must have a stock of patience and perseverance, of hopeful confidence — a willingness to learn, and a disposition not easily cast down by difficulties and disappointments.